The Derring-Do Club and the Empire of the Dead

by David Wake

  There were ropes on either side of the box, so it swung between Earnestine and Charlotte. Georgina quietly brought up the rear.

  They sloshed along the passageway, the light from Earnestine’s lantern casting its beams about the curved brick ceiling. There were slopes with stairs at the side in places where the unpleasant water cascaded down.

  “Is it me or is it getting deeper?” Charlotte asked.

  “It has been raining,” said Earnestine.

  They reached the right spot where two tunnels joined and further down was a raised brick area. They could hear distant mechanical sounds – they were close now – and their voices dropped to urgent whispers. Charlotte pointed and then hefted the ammunition box up onto their final redoubt, a metal covered platform, waist high, bolted into a brick base. At the far end a rectangle of shadow hid an opening. There were any number of passages leading off: they had to hold them here, otherwise they would overrun this underworld and then emerge all over London.

  “We can’t keep going back and forth for bullets,” said Earnestine.

  “Let’s fill our bags,” Charlotte said. She yanked open the top and handed a rifle to Earnestine.

  “We better take up position,” Earnestine said, “Gina, can you fill the bags for us?”

  “Sorry?”

  “Fill the bags with bullets.”

  “Yes.”

  Earnestine and Charlotte went to select the first line of defence while Georgina began to fill the bags.

  “This is too wide for Thermopylae…” said Charlotte. “It’s more like Isandlwana.”

  “That was a British defeat,” said Earnestine.

  “How about Laing’s Nek?”

  “The Boers won.”

  “At the end, our boys’ rifle fire allowed a retreat.”

  “What about–”

  Georgina snapped at them: “Stop bickering and pick something!”

  “Sorry.”

  Slowly, as they waited, the distant galvanic noises, sparks and pops began to be joined by growls and wailing. The sounds grew and, as the distance shortened, it became more distinct; there were splashes too, signs that the untoten army was near.

  “With all this water,” Charlotte whispered, “we ought to choose a naval battle. How about the Battle of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Nelson’s first against the Spanish.”

  “So this is Tenerife then?”

  “Yes.”

  Earnestine considered the dark, moody passageway, the constant dripping and the stench of foul water, and so unlike a Spanish island in the Atlantic. It was not the only part of Charlotte’s scheme that disturbed her.

  “Lottie?” she whispered.

  “Ness?”

  “Why do you choose nothing but British defeats?”

  “Oh… I thought you’d have realised,” said Charlotte, biting her lip. “It’s simply because we don’t stand a chance.”

  “Ah… yes, of course. Perhaps we could call the last redoubt ‘Rorke’s Drift’, it would…” Earnestine thought hard for the right phrase, “…cheer Georgina up.”

  “Very well,” Charlotte turned to shout to Georgina. “Gina! We’re calling the final redoubt ‘Rorke’s Drift’.”

  Georgina didn’t reply.

  “Ness, Georgina doesn’t look cheered up.”

  “She’s had a trying day.”

  Mrs Arthur Merryweather

  Georgina felt she’d finished sorting the ammunition. No matter which containers she shifted the brass cylinders into, they didn’t multiply. Indeed, some slipped from her shaking hands and dropped into the dirty water.

  With each handful dumped in the purses, she said: “Ammo.”

  “Gina,” Earnestine said. “Now, I think.”

  “Ammo… ammo… ammo…” It reminded her of something.

  “Gina!”

  Done, she thought, and all divided equally like chocolates at Christmas. She went over to the other two and handed out the bags: “Two boxes in… Rorke’s Drift, a purse each and the kit bag.”

  “Thank you,” said Earnestine, putting the medium kit bag over her shoulder.

  It came to her and she mumbled it aloud: “Ammo… ammas… ammat… ammarmus… ammartis… ammant.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I was just thinking.”

  It reminded her of another rhyme too: Amazo, Amazon, I’m–a… and she did feel lost, utterly and completely.

  “Amazons are warrior women,” Georgina said.

  “So are we,” Charlotte replied. “We’ll get them, won’t we?”

  “Yes,” said Georgina, “they don’t deserve to exist. We should wipe them all from the face of the Earth, purge their filthy perverted way of life and be done with them all.”

  “And then we’ll deal with the Austro–Hungarians.”

  “I was talking about the Austro–Hungarians!”

  “There’s Pieter,” Earnestine said.

  “Do you love him?” Georgina asked.

  “I beg your pardon!”

  “Do you love him?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous! Our families haven’t been introduced.”

  Charlotte interrupted any further discussion: “Look out!”

  The light at the end of the passage flickered, shadows moved, cast down the long tunnel by the creatures.

  The light at the corner was almost completely obscured and then the untoten army came into view.

  “Fire when you see the whites of their eyes,” said Charlotte.

  “Their eyes are bloodshot,” said Georgina.

  “Fire when… I tell you. We must stop them at twenty yards.”

  “That pipe in the wall?” said Earnestine.

  “…yes.”

  The rifle felt slippery in Georgina’s hand, and heavy, suddenly she couldn’t hold it up. Unbidden tears welled in her eyes and the approaching monstrosities appeared to blur and vanish. She could feel her heart in her chest beating and, despite her corset, her breathing quickened making her head spin. She took up position to Earnestine’s right and levelled the rifle. It wavered far more than the other two.

  “Gina, hold it together,” said Earnestine. “Stiff upper lip.”

  They were as ready as they’d ever be, she knew, and it felt good to be standing shoulder to shoulder with her sisters.

  “For Queen and Country,” Earnestine said.

  “For Arthur,” Georgina added.

  “Let’s nobble some Austro–Hungarian untoten right in their nancy,” said Charlotte.

  Earnestine was horrified: “Charlotte… language please!”

  Miss Charlotte

  Charlotte kept her gun steady, and the head of the central untoten was obscured by the far sight as it nestled in the valley of the near sight.

  Earnestine was lecturing quietly, droning on and on like the undead army approaching them: “Lottie, if we don’t maintain our standards, then what would be the purpose in winning… or, in this case, the purpose of making a stand? Being British doesn’t make us automatically better; instead, we must strive to better ourselves so we can be an example to the peoples of the Empire.”

  Or something like that, Charlotte didn’t listen.

  Instead, she concentrated on the dishevelled and lurching approach, an attack that blurred.

  She blinked: suddenly the untoten jumped into focus.

  “Concentrate on your flank,” she said. “If they get around us, we’re done for. Their numbers will count against us. And pick your targets… wait for it… wait… wait…”

  It became a chant or an off–stage prompt.

  I’ve left it too late, she thought.

  But she said: “Wait…”

  The books said to do this, but they seemed close, too close, far too close.

  “Wait…”

  Surely they were done for.

  The approaching army reached the pipe, came level, shuffled further and–

  “Fire!”

  Chapter XXVIII

  Miss Deering-Dolittle
/>   Silence.

  The noise of the echo was extraordinary, but Earnestine dropped to her knee and started reloading, counting in her head to follow Charlotte’s quick lesson – one… two… The bolt came back, the spent round expelled and then she rammed it home, it went in… thank you, thank you.

  Bang–bang–bang… bang–bang… bang!

  That was Charlotte’s revolver emptying.

  Earnestine was up, aim… aim, she forced herself to take her time, Charlotte’s drill ringing in her ears along with the gunshots. She picked one, the nearest struggling over the bodies of its compatriots… good heavens, she thought, Charlotte must have clocked one with each of her six rounds. Mustn’t let the side down, Earnestine thought, there… squeeze and–

  Bang!

  The monster’s head exploded.

  Down, reload.

  A hail of spent cartridges hailed down as Charlotte emptied the chambers of the revolver. She was quick, her hand reaching into one of her pockets for fresh shells.

  Bang! Georgina fired quickly above her making Earnestine jump despite the hammering they’d already been subjected to.

  Earnestine stood, there was another easy target, so she fired – too quickly and she only winged the creature.

  Amazing how elegant the .303 rifle was, the burnished steel bolt and the fine wooden stock with its grain and–

  Bang–bang… zing! Bang–bang–bang… bang.

  Earnestine couldn’t get her fingers to work, the stupid dumb bolt thing jammed, caught on the edge of the chamber–

  “Ness, take your time,” said Charlotte’s excited tones cut through the percussion.

  Cartridges fanned out in the light like shooting stars, tumbling through space as Charlotte had flipped open the revolver and thrown the smoking brass cylinders free. They bounced off approaching corpses.

  The bolt went home.

  Charlotte overtook her, standing to fire again, this time with the rifle. She was clearly saving the revolver for emergencies.

  Earnestine stood too and fired, a double explosion with her sister: bBANGg!

  Reloading.

  Georgina stood, firing once.

  Earnestine brought her rifle up, thumping it against her shoulder. They were bearing down now, the targets looming large and easy.

  Down again, chasing Charlotte and feeling a flush as if she was on the lawn knocking the balls around with ease, the mallet singing, the hoops–

  A monster was overhead, slavering and its raw eyes searching down. Her rifle went off in her hands, an instinctive reaction, and the bullet found its target more by luck than any skill. The head exploded, spraying brains across the beautifully constructed arched ceiling.

  Earnestine half–rose, realised where she was, back in the first part of the reload–aim–fire sequence, and crouched again. The bolt came back and the empty round flashed briefly in the firelight to fall upon the brass–flecked floor, the objects bright and shiny amongst the filth. How many rounds had she fired? The thought leapt into her mind, pushing everything else out: she’d fired… out of ten… she didn’t know. There were lashings of spent cartridges on the floor, so if she divided by–

  Charlotte’s revolver started firing.

  Divide by eight… count to three, ten rounds, five in a charging clip… there were too many numbers! Her hands moved automatically, the bolt going in and she rose, aimed, fired!

  “Tactical withdraw!” Charlotte screamed; her face ignited like one of those new–fangled photographic flashes with each detonation of fire and thunder from her service revolver. “Rorke’s Drift!”

  Mrs Arthur Merryweather

  They backed up.

  Georgina stumbled as she was trying to reload. There were untoten around them now on both sides trying to outflank them. Bodies twitched impossibly on the floor. Georgina’s knee connected with the platform and her rifle sprang free to clatter across the wrought iron metalwork. She yelped and Earnestine’s strong hands grabbed her by her blouse, lifted her and flung her across the platform surface. Georgina fell awkwardly on top of her rifle and this, more than anything, shocked her into fighting.

  She turned, sitting on the floor, and pulled the trigger.

  Nothing!

  The trigger was loose and quite useless.

  She hadn’t reloaded.

  Two creatures grabbed Earnestine, pulling her back. Charlotte appeared as if from nowhere, fired at the right hand one and then emptied her revolver downwards to shoot those that were grabbing Earnestine’s ankles and legs. The youngster flipped the big black gun open skilfully. Unbelievably, Georgina heard the tinkling bell–like sounds as the six spent cartridges pinged off the hard stone floor.

  The monster that held Earnestine bared its teeth; bloody canines came down towards the young lady’s bare throat.

  There was a metal–on–metal sound and Georgina’s rifle reloaded as if by itself, her body now reacting like it was its own clockwork model. She lunged forward, half crawling, and shoved the barrel into the mouth of the undead man. And fired, blowing its head off at less than point blank range.

  “Get on!” Georgina yelled, feeling the rasp of air forced across her throat, but hearing only her blood pounding in her skull.

  Earnestine came up and over the edge. Her lips opened and she mouthed ‘rifle’, spittle drizzling across Georgina’s face. Earnestine’s weapon was loose, rotating almost majestically as it dropped hard against the gantry, its butt vibrating the surface and its barrel belched fire. The roof above exploded, brick shrapnel and mortar dust hailed down. The rifle hovered and then slowly, ever so slowly; it toppled like a felled tree disappearing into the charnel house below.

  “Bally thing–”

  Earnestine turned and disappeared after it.

  “Ness!!!”

  Georgina wasn’t sure if she’d shouted, or whether it was Charlotte, as she flipped her own rifle, hefted it round and struck an approaching untoten. She hit another, double–handed backhand, then under arm like a croquet mallet. The fake human burst offering no resistance and Georgina tumbled forward, the rifle’s heavy momentum carrying her over the edge. She landed on something soft, something disgustingly soft and–

  Everything was suddenly slavering corpse, a massive face, teeth and false breath, reddened eyes mad with fury and rage; blood flecked across Georgina as it came down for the kill and–

  Earnestine stood briefly in Georgina’s vision, rifle in hand as the untoten split apart from the shot. Charlotte was above them, standing on the platform and firing like a demented harpy engaged in her own struggle and yet she was making every shell count.

  Georgina fired another round and rolled herself onto the gantry using her momentum to bring herself to her feet. Her gun was to her shoulder and she fired again, the reloading now just part of the action.

  Earnestine hurdled onto the platform too, again turning and firing.

  Charlotte had reloaded, a blur of fingers popping rounds from the medium kit bag. She fired again, not at those nearest enemies trying to climb aboard, but further away.

  Georgina was on the right flank and concentrated from right to left: Earnestine was on the far left working as if across a page. She only hoped that they overlapped, because Charlotte wasn’t even looking at the central area but kept firing, the revolver up and aimed with precision.

  Except when one vile claw reached across and seized her ankle; she fired down, a single shot.

  There was a respite, a blink of an eye.

  Georgina risked taking in the wider picture.

  Charlotte was firing at Thermopylae. It didn’t make sense at first, but then Georgina realised and loosed off a round in that direction when Charlotte was reloading. The untoten were struggling over the wall of bodies that had built up across the Spartan pass and this was slowing them down. The killing ground below the redoubt was cleared by Earnestine’s methodical approach and suddenly they were no longer under direct attack.

  The blink of an eye became a pause.
<
br />   Except there were still creatures coming into the area below from…

  Georgina looked round, saw and shouted: “Behind us!”

  Miss Charlotte

  The enemy closed from both directions, a pincer movement cutting off any retreat. Charlotte didn’t know how they’d outflanked them, but it hardly mattered. The fog of war confused everything. If their task was to prevent the enemy reaching the sewers, then they had failed utterly.

  “Down!” she shouted.

  The others ducked either side and she let rip with both revolvers, flipping her head left and then right to take aim, firing alternately. They retreated backwards, giving ground. The British Bull Dog clicked empty first, but the Webley had another chamber. As they killed their opponents, so the bodies formed a slope and the creatures came higher each time they reached the edge, until finally one stumbled up and onto their redoubt.

  Like a tide, the attack breached their defences.

  It was over: each shot required them to take a step back. In the narrow brick–lined confines the noise was deafening. Georgina screamed long and hard letting all the air out of her lungs. Charlotte knew it was hopeless.

  Left and right, they were boxed in, but strangely, the brick wall behind looked distorted further along, like a turning was appearing when Charlotte fired, the glow of the discharge etching a frame with light.

  “Door!” Georgina shouted, pointlessly, and she grabbed Charlotte and dragged her along.

  “Gina!” Charlotte yelled, shocked that Georgina had jumped up into her line of fire.

  Charlotte reached the indentation in the wall. In the dark it had been invisible, but the sparks from the gunfire had highlighted the alcove.

  Earnestine pushed up too, levelled her .303.

  “That’s not loaded,” said Charlotte

  “I know,” Earnestine said. She jabbed the barrel into the lock and levered down. The lock was fine, good solid Sheffield steel and it bent the barrel out of true, but the rotten, wooden door gave and the entire bracket came away.